March 02, 2004

short bio

I have earned a Bachelor of Education and a Master's of Education, both from the University of Saskatchewan. I am currently a PhD candidate at the University of Regina. Although I am involved in several research projects, my PhD research is focused on the use of Open Source software in educational environments. I believe that Open Source and its related movements have tremendous potential in providing good quality resources to our educational system, and may also provide a relevant philosophical and collaborative model worth studying and pursuing.

Before entering my position at the University of Regina, I had several years of teaching and administration experience. This includes, but is not limited to, working in the following positions:
- a high-school teacher at St. Michaels Residential School (Duck Lake, Saskatchewan)
- a teacher/therapist at Killborn Hall Youth Centre (Young Offender Facility) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
- Computer Information Systems Coordinator at the Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technologies.
- Computer Science sessional lecturer at the University of Saskatchewan, University of Regina and the First Nations University of Canada (formerly the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College).

Although my narrow focus at this point in time relates to the Open Source Movement, I am heavily involved in a more general framework of study that involves two major strands. First, my undergraduate teaching is related to the appropriate use of technology in the classroom, and thus, I look to technology as an effective teaching and learning tool. Second, as a general focus, I am very much interested in studying the effects of technology on education, culture and society. And with this second strand, I take a broad media studies approach and have spent much time looking at issues of web awareness, online safety, digital plagiarism, the use of emerging communication tools (e.g., MSN, chat) and issues related to the ownership of knowledge.